Nightblade stamina help - I can't stay alive

psufan5

Any tips on surviving a little better as a nightblade stamina build in PVE? I generally always run stamina in PVP and do pretty well, but that is besides the point.

In PVE in small groups (farming xp or dungeons), I find it rather impossible to stay alive. As a cloth / heavy tank user, I can pretty much solo anything. Obviously it's due to the nightblade not being able to heal when wearing leather, but is there any other way? Cloaking wont work on stronger mobs, so they rip me up. Blocking gets rid of all of my stamina, so I can't take them down quickly.

I am starting to think leather/stamina nightblade is only "good" when you have a lot of healing and in larger raid scenarios?

Any tips?

Thanks.

Nestor

Did you put all your attributes into Stamina? Did you choose the Stamina Morphs for the skills? Do you have Stamina Glyphs on your armor? Did you put Champion Points into your armor and attack support constellations for your chosen build? You want to go with a Stamina Build, you have to go all in on Stamina.*







*I still put some points into Health as I am not chasing the ultimate DPS, just need to survive the mobs.

Sharee

As a stamina NB your best bet is to use restoration staff as a secondary weapon, and use rapid regeneration on yourself and quick siphon on your target. Quick siphon heals for a lot, especially if you use rapid strikes (the heal procs on every tick). Both spells are fairly cheap and long-lasting, so you being stamina build is not a problem.

psufan5

Nestor wrote: »

Did you put all your attributes into Stamina? Did you choose the Stamina Morphs for the skills? Do you have Stamina Glyphs on your armor? Did you put Champion Points into your armor and attack support constellations for your chosen build? You want to go with a Stamina Build, you have to go all in on Stamina.*







*I still put some points into Health as I am not chasing the ultimate DPS, just need to survive the mobs.

I put all of my points into health to try to stay alive. Still not working lol. Should I just go all in you think?

Inactive Account

Do you have Heavy Armour leveled up to 22 yet?

When you do add the Active skill to your rotation. It boosts your Spell resistance and your Armour. (18 secs at level one, if I remember correctly.)

LunaRae

Hey psufan5,

There are lots of fun ways you can take on small groups of enemies but first

• What weapons do you use? DW? bow? Sword and Board??
• How many mobs do you try to take on? 4? 10?

I use Dual Wield (DW) as my primary PvE and here are the abilities I choose to use

• Killers Blade (Stam morph) - Get Healed for 18% max HP when target dies within 2 seconds of casting. I always use this as the executioner (deals up to +300% dmg) to get a heal in fights to survive.
• Shadowy Disguise - This is great for either initiating a fight to ensure you get the out of combat stealth attack bonus (if sneaking alone won't cut it) and also to disengage from a fight. It's also great in-combat to get behind a target to use surprise attack which will cause major breach and stun
• Surprise Attack (Stam morph) - Huge out of stealth dmg dealer, and in combat combos great with shadowy disguise. You should be able to one shot, or nearly one shot, any regular mob in a group to open a fight
• Reapers Mark - This ability also causes Major Breach and spell reduction, so while it doesn't stack w/ surprise attack it does give you an incredible in-combat 25% max HP heal when you kill a target AND you get a 25% dmg boost.
• Free slot, consider a DW ability like Flurry, Blood Craze, Whirlwind - You can play around with this slot, the first four abilities should be able to handle just about anything. I like Flurry for single target boss fights, Blood Craze for sustain (gives healing while bleeding opponent) and Whirlwind for AoE mob clearing

Here's how a fight goes for me, it can typically contain anywhere for 3-6 mobs

• Always open fight with stealth, kill one mob from stealth with Surprise Attack
• If it's a smaller group (say 3) I'll re-stealth w/ Shadowy Disguise, get behind next mob and surprise attack again and burst it down with Flurry and execute w/ Killers Blade.
• If It's a larger group (say 6) I'll instead Reapers Mark a weak target (look for healer mobs, mage mobs) and keep my stam/mag use to a minimum - throw in a few light/heavy attacks, when they get to execute range for my killers blade pop it for the kill and get 43% of my max HP back instantly. Then rinse and repeat

Because I don't have any direct healing, like from the siphoning tree or a restoration staff bar, it's extremely important to stay on top of my killers blade / reapers mark rotation. You should always be focusing on a single target and getting your big heals from RM / KB, then moving on to the next target.

You can of course play entirely different, say w/ a siphoning magika build, or a sap tank build. If you play much differently than my DW let me know and I can try to put something together for ya. Have fun out there

Edit: Oh, and for managing my Stamina I always try to get in heavy DW attacks and have Stam potions. If a mob is at, say 40-50% HP, I don't use abilities that cost resources to lower their HP - instead I charge a heavy attack to get them down to execute range, which gives me some stam back and then I use Killers Blade - much more efficient.

psufan5

LunaRae wrote: »

Hey psufan5,

There are lots of fun ways you can take on small groups of enemies but first

• What weapons do you use? DW? bow? Sword and Board??
• How many mobs do you try to take on? 4? 10?

I use Dual Wield (DW) as my primary PvE and here are the abilities I choose to use

• Killers Blade (Stam morph) - Get Healed for 18% max HP when target dies within 2 seconds of casting. I always use this as the executioner (deals up to +300% dmg) to get a heal in fights to survive.
• Shadowy Disguise - This is great for either initiating a fight to ensure you get the out of combat stealth attack bonus (if sneaking alone won't cut it) and also to disengage from a fight. It's also great in-combat to get behind a target to use surprise attack which will cause major breach and stun
• Surprise Attack (Stam morph) - Huge out of stealth dmg dealer, and in combat combos great with shadowy disguise. You should be able to one shot, or nearly one shot, any regular mob in a group to open a fight
• Reapers Mark - This ability also causes Major Breach and spell reduction, so while it doesn't stack w/ surprise attack it does give you an incredible in-combat 25% max HP heal when you kill a target AND you get a 25% dmg boost.
• Free slot, consider a DW ability like Flurry, Blood Craze, Whirlwind - You can play around with this slot, the first four abilities should be able to handle just about anything. I like Flurry for single target boss fights, Blood Craze for sustain (gives healing while bleeding opponent) and Whirlwind for AoE mob clearing

Here's how a fight goes for me, it can typically contain anywhere for 3-6 mobs

• Always open fight with stealth, kill one mob from stealth with Surprise Attack
• If it's a smaller group (say 3) I'll re-stealth w/ Shadowy Disguise, get behind next mob and surprise attack again and burst it down with Flurry and execute w/ Killers Blade.
• If It's a larger group (say 6) I'll instead Reapers Mark a weak target (look for healer mobs, mage mobs) and keep my stam/mag use to a minimum - throw in a few light/heavy attacks, when they get to execute range for my killers blade pop it for the kill and get 43% of my max HP back instantly. Then rinse and repeat

Because I don't have any direct healing, like from the siphoning tree or a restoration staff bar, it's extremely important to stay on top of my killers blade / reapers mark rotation. You should always be focusing on a single target and getting your big heals from RM / KB, then moving on to the next target.

You can of course play entirely different, say w/ a siphoning magika build, or a sap tank build. If you play much differently than my DW let me know and I can try to put something together for ya. Have fun out there

Edit: Oh, and for managing my Stamina I always try to get in heavy DW attacks and have Stam potions. If a mob is at, say 40-50% HP, I don't use abilities that cost resources to lower their HP - instead I charge a heavy attack to get them down to execute range, which gives me some stam back and then I use Killers Blade - much more efficient.

Bow / DW. I don't have issues killing large numbers of mobs, my issue is killing big baddies that you cant crowd control. Being stamina based, heals are pretty miserable. When I use cloth / magika build, i can pretty much take anything. I think the main issue is stamina being drained from blocking, where as a mag build, you can do both.

Fruitmass

What I find works best when trying to take world bosses or public dungeon bosses solo is focusing on damage mitigation. When kiting doesn't work the best option is to not get hit as much as possible, when you do get hit try to minimize the damage as much as possible.

Generally in that situation I find it easier to use DW than the bow. The current skills I'm using aren't really much different than what I used pre-patch: Rapid Strikes, Swallow Soul, Shuffle, Relentless Focus, Dark Shades and Bolstering Darkness. Depending on the boss there's some variation in skills, I might swap in Mirage or Deadly Cloak for heavy hitters or swap Relentless Focus for Evil Hunter if I'm going against daedra and undead.

Most of my set bonuses and CP is focused on Stamina regen and healing/potion effectiveness. The bulk of my attributes are in health. I wear 5 medium pieces and use stamina boosting and absorbing enchantments. It also helps that I'm an Argonian alchemist and use Panacea of Weapon Crit potions. These wonderful babies are easy to craft and increase my crit rating, restore health and stamina and increase my health/stamina regen. Also food buffs, always food buffs.

Now when starting a fight against a CC immune boss I get into position then go into sneak mode for the auto crit and lead with Focused Aim quickly followed by Venom Arrow. Then swap to DW and put up Relentless Focus, Shuffle and Dark Shades.

If it's a melee boss I'll use bolstering Darkness early in the fight and try to keep my health up with Swallow Soul saving my potions for emergencies as much as possible.

If it's a ranged boss, I'll likely swap bolstering darkness for Soul Tether and engage with the bow. Keeping Relentless focus up as much as possible and using Swallow Soul for maintenance heal. When health gets critically low I'll get close and use Soul Tether or potions.

Hysterically you can dodge roll and avoid staff and bow projectiles. It takes a bit to get the rhythm and each type of spell caster has a different attack speed but it can be done. Sometimes in those situations it's better to save your stamina for dodging and just let your DoTs and light attacks do the real damage. So pretty much Relentless focus, dodge, Venom Arrow, dodge, Swallow Soul, dodge, light attack and dodge until Venom arrow needs to be reapplied, rinse and repeat, boss dies, loot, smile.

I've soloed nearly every world boss, public dungeon boss and dolmen in this manner and it's been pretty smooth going. Think there was only ever one boss that drove me nuts and that was the Whispmother in the Rift, but I did finally get her yesterday with Scorched Earth and Bombard .

Dukegaming

Sharee wrote: »

As a stamina NB your best bet is to use restoration staff as a secondary weapon, and use rapid regeneration on yourself and quick siphon on your target. Quick siphon heals for a lot, especially if you use rapid strikes (the heal procs on every tick). Both spells are fairly cheap and long-lasting, so you being stamina build is not a problem.

Rapid Regeneration isn't as effective when you're a stamina build. I've gone through this testing in Crag, however Quick Siphon might be effective.

psufan5 wrote: »

Any tips on surviving a little better as a nightblade stamina build in PVE? I generally always run stamina in PVP and do pretty well, but that is besides the point.

In PVE in small groups (farming xp or dungeons), I find it rather impossible to stay alive. As a cloth / heavy tank user, I can pretty much solo anything. Obviously it's due to the nightblade not being able to heal when wearing leather, but is there any other way? Cloaking wont work on stronger mobs, so they rip me up. Blocking gets rid of all of my stamina, so I can't take them down quickly.

I am starting to think leather/stamina nightblade is only "good" when you have a lot of healing and in larger raid scenarios?

Any tips?

Thanks.

If you wish to run around Crag farming random groups of mobs, I suggest doing what I did. 2H, 7/7 Medium and just using Brawler. Spamming this while having 5-7+ mobs on you, lets just say the only trouble I had was running out of stamina. The bar I had set up was as follows: Reverse Slice(Not Needed), Brawler, Critical Rush(Not Needed), Power Extraction(Damage based off Weapon Damage and Max Stamina), Siphoning Attacks(Toggle when you need Stamina), Soul Tether(If you get in a pickle). I suggest going on to the PTS and seeing how this works for you, and if you might want to change abilities around.
Remember, this is specifically for farming mobs around Craglorn and elsewhere.

Now for Dungeons the only thing I can say is Medium Armor gives 0 Spell Resistance, which I found to be a problem for specific dungeons where a boss deals heavy Magicka Damage. My opinion is that there needs to be a defensive passive made for Medium Armor, somewhat like how Light Armor has Spell Warding. You might be able to get by with using Circle of Protection or Bone Shield(depending on what would be more beneficial). Spending champion points into defensive perks in the various Champion Point trees might also help boost defensive capabilities. Also look at different Item Sets to see if any set bonuses might be able to help with your survivability.
Being alive and dealing damage is better than being dead constantly from sudden nukes that you didn't react to fast enough.

I never had fun playing a Stamina Nightblade, I switched between Magicka and Stamina builds about 7 or 8 times because Stamina was shredding my confidence about being able to survive and not instantly get nuked, where as a Magicka build was about spamming one ability and never dying(Sap Essence).

I would like to add in that I did know one DW Stamina Build DK that used primarily Heavy Armor, and did more DPS than I could as a Stamina NB(approx. 800-1k DPS), this was around the time when Upper Craglorn was released, I don't know how its changed as of now, I also don't know how well it would affect a NB as compared to a DK. So my tip is, throw on some Heavy Armor, see how it works compared to Medium, try different item sets if you have the resources to do so. Stamina builds do feel better than prior to 1.6, and more improvements might be on the horizon.

Yusuf

reaper's mark on the enemy with the lowest health. you're welcome.

psufan5

Yusuf wrote: »

reaper's mark on the enemy with the lowest health. you're welcome.

Been there done that. Problem arises when there are no other enemies and it's just you and the boss (who cant be CC'd). The inability to heal it pretty rough.

psufan5

Dukegaming wrote: »

Sharee wrote: »

As a stamina NB your best bet is to use restoration staff as a secondary weapon, and use rapid regeneration on yourself and quick siphon on your target. Quick siphon heals for a lot, especially if you use rapid strikes (the heal procs on every tick). Both spells are fairly cheap and long-lasting, so you being stamina build is not a problem.

Rapid Regeneration isn't as effective when you're a stamina build. I've gone through this testing in Crag, however Quick Siphon might be effective.

psufan5 wrote: »

Any tips on surviving a little better as a nightblade stamina build in PVE? I generally always run stamina in PVP and do pretty well, but that is besides the point.

In PVE in small groups (farming xp or dungeons), I find it rather impossible to stay alive. As a cloth / heavy tank user, I can pretty much solo anything. Obviously it's due to the nightblade not being able to heal when wearing leather, but is there any other way? Cloaking wont work on stronger mobs, so they rip me up. Blocking gets rid of all of my stamina, so I can't take them down quickly.

I am starting to think leather/stamina nightblade is only "good" when you have a lot of healing and in larger raid scenarios?

Any tips?

Thanks.

If you wish to run around Crag farming random groups of mobs, I suggest doing what I did. 2H, 7/7 Medium and just using Brawler. Spamming this while having 5-7+ mobs on you, lets just say the only trouble I had was running out of stamina. The bar I had set up was as follows: Reverse Slice(Not Needed), Brawler, Critical Rush(Not Needed), Power Extraction(Damage based off Weapon Damage and Max Stamina), Siphoning Attacks(Toggle when you need Stamina), Soul Tether(If you get in a pickle). I suggest going on to the PTS and seeing how this works for you, and if you might want to change abilities around.
Remember, this is specifically for farming mobs around Craglorn and elsewhere.

Now for Dungeons the only thing I can say is Medium Armor gives 0 Spell Resistance, which I found to be a problem for specific dungeons where a boss deals heavy Magicka Damage. My opinion is that there needs to be a defensive passive made for Medium Armor, somewhat like how Light Armor has Spell Warding. You might be able to get by with using Circle of Protection or Bone Shield(depending on what would be more beneficial). Spending champion points into defensive perks in the various Champion Point trees might also help boost defensive capabilities. Also look at different Item Sets to see if any set bonuses might be able to help with your survivability.
Being alive and dealing damage is better than being dead constantly from sudden nukes that you didn't react to fast enough.

I never had fun playing a Stamina Nightblade, I switched between Magicka and Stamina builds about 7 or 8 times because Stamina was shredding my confidence about being able to survive and not instantly get nuked, where as a Magicka build was about spamming one ability and never dying(Sap Essence).

I would like to add in that I did know one DW Stamina Build DK that used primarily Heavy Armor, and did more DPS than I could as a Stamina NB(approx. 800-1k DPS), this was around the time when Upper Craglorn was released, I don't know how its changed as of now, I also don't know how well it would affect a NB as compared to a DK. So my tip is, throw on some Heavy Armor, see how it works compared to Medium, try different item sets if you have the resources to do so. Stamina builds do feel better than prior to 1.6, and more improvements might be on the horizon.

Thank you! Some great info